As the days passed, Nebula Games started warming up the promotion for Minecraft.
While players and designers in the industry were still talking about the rise of sandbox games,
Lucas dropped a simple post that instantly grabbed the attention of countless players and designers.
The post was very simple, just a few familiar words: New Game.
Then he shared a video link.
But when players, full of curiosity and excitement, clicked on it, they were instantly stunned.
Because what they saw was completely unexpected.
With a soothing BGM playing, the game screen appeared.
Blue skies, white clouds, oceans, trees, and beaches. From the setting sun in the distance, a little blocky figure came running, riding a pink pig.
"Let's go to a world made of blocks."
As the narrator's voice played, countless blocks formed into a slide, carrying the little block man and the pink pig down together.
"The only limit is your imagination."
The slide suddenly collapsed, blocks scattering, but the little block man spread out bright red wings like a cape, soaring through forests and across mountains.
"Let's go anywhere you want to go, climb the tallest mountains, dig the deepest caves."
On the beach, the block man placed a cube in front of him.
"Build anything you want, whether it's day or night, rain or shine."
He stood in the desert, gazing into the distance.
"This will be the most meaningful sandbox game you've ever played."
The next moment, the screen showed a huge castle.
"Build a grand castle."
Inside a cave filled with torches, a winding track stretched forward.
"Research the most advanced machines, ride a roller coaster."
In the forest, several blocky people were chopping trees with axes.
"You can play with your friends, build your own community, and make the strongest armor to protect yourselves."
At night, when monsters appeared in the forest, the blocky people put on armor, grabbed swords, and charged forward.
"At night, fight monsters, with no one to limit your actions."
Digging deep underground, lava poured in from below.
A dark, mysterious portal was created, leading to a strange new world.
"There are no rules you must follow. This adventure is yours to decide."
As the narration ended, the camera slowly moved across a deep blue ocean. A whale made of blocks suddenly surfaced.
Countless blocks then formed the game's logo and title: Minecraft.
[Test begins January 3, full release February 1]
[Game Price: $10]
With this promotional video released, many players — and even game designers — were left stunned.
Because before this, no one ever thought Lucas would actually make a pixel game.
"No way, a pixel game? And it even looks a bit like building with toy blocks?"
"What was Lucas thinking? How could he suddenly make a pixel game, and one that plays like stacking blocks?"
"I'm confused too. Is this for little kids?"
"I'm completely lost. Forget games like Dark Souls or It Takes Two, at least give us something like Don't Starve! And if not, Silent Hill PT would've been fine too. But instead, he made a block-stacking game?"
"Don't rush to bash it yet. I think it looks kind of fun, actually, and it seems very free. Especially the part with no rules — doesn't that sound exciting?"
"To be fair, even though it's a pixel game, it doesn't look cheap. Didn't you notice how nice the textures are? The details are rich, and when you break blocks, the patterns change. And even though it's pixels, the lighting effects are really well done too!"
"But that's exactly why I don't get it! These things definitely aren't cheap to make. That means Lucas didn't choose pixels to save money, so why go with pixels at all!?"
It wasn't just players — even people in the game industry had a lot of questions about Lucas and this game called Minecraft.
It was simply too confusing.
From the promotional video, they could only sum up three main points.
The first was that it was a pixel-style game.
The second was that the game had monster-fighting and resource-gathering, but unlike Don't Starve, the gameplay here turned into stacking blocks.
The third was that, like Don't Starve, Minecraft also supported multiplayer.
As for more detailed content, that was still unclear.
But the question remained — what exactly was the game's selling point?
Survival?
Don't Starve already had that.
Fighting monsters, collecting resources, and building? Don't Starve had that too.
Multiplayer? Don't Starve had that as well.
And the graphics — still pixel style. Other than the different camera view, there didn't seem to be any major change.
For a while, many game designers were puzzled.
Based on those points, they really wanted to dismiss Minecraft. But the one behind it wasn't some unknown indie designer — it was Lucas.
The same Lucas who had just made Don't Starve and sparked a wave of sandbox games. Could he really not know what he was doing?
At NetDragon, the studio behind Wasteland, Marcus also looked completely confused.
After last year's failure of Star God as a Game of the Year candidate, he had worked on several projects this year.
But none of them as a lead. He had even joined Game Division's VR test project and learned a lot.
Earlier, inspired by Lucas's Don't Starve, he had decided to start a sandbox game project himself.
That was how Wasteland got started.
But he never expected that at this key moment, Lucas would launch another project — and one that left him scratching his head.
Like most designers in the industry, he also felt Minecraft didn't seem very appealing. But the one making it was Lucas.
Thinking about Lucas's career in recent years, and his own impression of him, Marcus felt something about this Minecraft had to be off.
Just then, his assistant knocked on the door and walked in. "Mr. Marcus, the promotion plan for Wasteland has been finalized, and the release date has been set."
Marcus took the file from his assistant and glanced through it. But when he saw the schedule, he hesitated.
"The timing…" Marcus frowned.
The release and promotion of Wasteland seemed to line up with Minecraft, only a few days apart.
"Put a hold on the promotion for now." After thinking for a moment, Marcus spoke to his assistant.
Hearing this, the assistant froze and quickly said, "Mr. Marcus, if we delay now, we won't get this much promotional support later."
This time Wasteland had so many resources mainly because it happened to overlap with SkyNova's schedule.
But if they avoided the clash now, it wouldn't really matter. The Wasteland project wasn't aimed at SkyNova anyway, no matter how much outsiders exaggerated it. As a designer under NetDragon, Marcus knew it was just a coincidence.
For the company, what really mattered was making sure the game sold well.
But Marcus wasn't worried about SkyNova's new game. What unsettled him was Lucas's Minecraft.
"No rush… there's still time. Help me see if we can book a spot this week." Marcus mentioned the name of a place to his assistant, then pulled out his phone and found Lucas in his contacts.
He was planning to do some "PY"—well, to put it right, a bit of designer-to-designer networking. At the same time, he wanted to get a feel for what Minecraft was really like.
(End of The Chapter)
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